


Timeless

by God_of_Insanity



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Gift Fic, M/M, No Sex, Pining, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Yaoi, m/m - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:21:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28237626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/God_of_Insanity/pseuds/God_of_Insanity
Summary: Over and over again in time, Vincent fails to save Lucrecia’s son, until he does.
Relationships: Vincent Valentine/Sephiroth
Comments: 11
Kudos: 25





	Timeless

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TimelessValentine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TimelessValentine/gifts).



> Happy Birthday <3<3<3

The first time Vincent traveled through time, had been an accident. While it had been an accident, it had not been completely unintentional. A part of himself had longed for it, had hoped for it somehow. A second chance to change things, to prevent tragedy. To step up to the challenges that he had cowered from in the past. If only, if only he had…

If only he had done something.

_If only he had done something._

With this mantra in his head, Vincent had spent a considerable number of years searching for something, _anything_ , to fill the gaping void in himself. His friends had aged considerably over time as they lived their lives with their loved ones and life goals. Even Nanaki had a family now. It was all things that Vincent’s younger self had longed for, but the person he was now, knew he would never have it. He was not even certain if he even wanted such things anymore, even if he could achieve it. Being what he was now, as detached as he felt at times, it felt impossible to fully connect to anyone else. He had Nanaki, as a friend, one that would live a long time, but it still wasn’t enough for him. Vincent needed more, craved for more, from something, from someone.

No one was like him and no one could understand him. All the ones that could, the few of them…were gone. As painfully aware of all that as he was, he had come to accept that, in time. Or so, he had thought. A part of him just could not accept it. There had to be something, anything, for him to grasp onto. What he did not expect, was what it ended up being.

At first, his tortured mind was dominated by thoughts of Lucrecia, of what she’d been to him and what he’d wanted her to be to him. He’d desired a life with her, any life, even if one of just friendship, so when that was taken from him, it had been overbearingly difficult to bear. Love had blinded him to her bad traits and habits, had caused him to keep his mouth shut and stand back when he should have acted sooner.

But now that she’d been gone for years, pretty much dead in her crystal prison, he could more fully reflect on everything. It took some time, but even he had begun to realize that she wasn’t this perfect, beautiful woman. She wasn’t as much a victim as he’d perceived her to be. It pained him to admit it, but she had been far from innocent in all this. Lucrecia had willingly subjected herself to Hojo and the experiments. And not just herself, her own baby…

 _Sephiroth_.

The only thing that pained him more than thoughts of Lucrecia, were thoughts of Sephiroth, her tragic son. Unlike her, and Vincent himself, Sephiroth had never had a true chance in life. Everyone else…had had families, friends, and real aspirations and choices on what they wanted to be in life.

But not Sephiroth. He’d grown up a caged beast forced to perform for his cruel masters. Everything had been decided for him, predestined, even. When Vincent pondered on it, he thought it was surprising that Sephiroth hadn’t snapped sooner than he had. It was a madness that Vincent understood to some extent. Yes, Vincent knew he himself wasn’t the sanest one of them all, either. He was far from sane and had deep-rooted issues and too many of them for normal people to tolerate, which had been painfully pointed out to him on numerous occasions. It was probably why he viewed Sephiroth differently than everyone else. Everyone else despised Shinra’s ex-General and branded him a monster. Vincent knew better.

The pale gunman’s mind now was dominated by consuming thoughts of Lucrecia’s fallen son. The more he thought about him, the more his guilt deepened. His well of guilt was now an endless sea of guilt, rolling waves now crashing violently inside of him.

Vincent had failed him. Failing to help Lucrecia had burned him deeply as it were, but an innocent child? That seemed so much worse. Worse because Vincent could have done something, anything. But no, he did nothing because he had been a spineless coward. He’d hesitated, turned away and when he finally did do something, it had been much too late. And even after, after he’d become the thing he was now, he still had done nothing until it had been too late to save Sephiroth from his own descent into madness.

The crimson-eyed man had never known Sephiroth, had never directly spoken to him. And yet, the more he thought about him, the more he felt he knew about him. The more he dwelled on the tragic ex-General, the more connected he felt to him. Out of all the living beings in the world, the only person he could connect to, was technically dead and gone.

_A mere memory._

Which led him back to his accident. All of these years, he’d yearned to correct his mistakes, to actually do something useful. He’d entertained thoughts of somehow going back and smacking himself into action. Maybe then…things would be different, and Sephiroth would still be alive, along with many others. If only he could…go back and makes things right _._

_If only._

Imagine his surprise when he’d encountered a strange materia, a materia swirling with countless colors, nearly appearing white, and inspiring a myriad of emotions to swirl within his being. Looking at it had made him feel strange and yet familiar, as if he were looking into the face of someone he knew but didn’t know. Both hope and hopelessness consumed him as he stared at it, his mind’s eye recalling images of a beautiful man doomed to nothing but madness, fire, and death _. If only, if only it didn’t have to be that way. If only he could change that, could save him from himself and the cruel, dark world._ As Vincent thought these thoughts while staring at the orb, he reached out towards it. Before he could stop himself, let alone realize what he was even doing, the distracted gunman picked the materia up.

The moment Vincent had touched the materia, everything exploded in a contradicting world of light and darkness. He saw nothing, yet everything. He felt his body rise and travel through darkness exploding with countless lights. The gunman felt like he was flying and falling at the same time, through space and possibly time. When he was aware of himself again, he found himself in a state of déjà vu. He knew this place, somehow. It looked familiar, so familiar. And yet, it felt off in the way that he felt he didn’t belong here.

_Was this real, or was this a dream?_

Rising from the grassy ground, that’s when he saw her. And himself. His younger, foolish self. Walking together under the trees, which was something Lucrecia liked to do to find some peace especially on a hectic day. Slipping behind the safety of a tree, he watched Lucrecia and his Turk self, interacting here in this place and time. It was possible he was hallucinating this, and it wasn’t real. It was far easier to believe he was seeing things than to believe that he was now in the past. The only thing that convinced him it was the latter was because it felt undeniably real. He’d hallucinated in the past, enough to know the feeling, but this, this was nothing like any of that. This was real. It had to be. But, how…?

The materia. The strange materia…had done something, had transported him here. But how and why? When he’d touched it, he’d been thinking about Sephiroth. About if only he’d have the chance at saving him. Was that how it worked? Was he really in the past, and if so, was that why he was here? To save Lucrecia and her son?

Looking at her now, he could see that her stomach was still mostly flat but knew that she was undeniably pregnant. The way he felt about her was complex and sometimes differed day to day depending on his mood. A part of him would always love her, that much he felt to be true; however, there were parts of him that felt a deep-rooted loathing for the woman. Everything that she put him through, and Sephiroth through, made him feel bitter towards her. He often wondered why she went along with Hojo, why she would agree to subject her own well-being to such inhumane experiments. But most of all, he wondered how a woman like her could willingly subject her own baby to such unfathomable cruelty. It didn’t matter that she had had a change of heart because it had been too late. Like Vincent, she had taken too long to act against Hojo.

At first, he had been in denial. The gunman had believed that Hojo had forced her, threatened her somehow. He had ignored the fact that Lucrecia had _willingly_ married Hojo and had rejected Vincent in several ways. But now he knew better. She had been a willing participant from the beginning. She wasn’t some child groomed by an older man. No, she had been an adult woman and had been fully capable of making her own decisions regarding her own life. Like Hojo, who he vehemently hated comparing her to, she had discarded her morals in favor of her dream of becoming a brilliant scientist. She should have known better; she should have stopped it right from the beginning. But then again, Vincent should have done the same. And just like her, he had stepped in and spoken up when it had been much too late. The consequences of his actions, or should he say, lack of action, were something he was always reminded of whenever he looked in a reflective service and saw his own unnaturally pale skin, glowing red eyes, and the ugly scars marring his body.

Lucrecia should have just let him die that day. But she hadn’t and there were days that he resented her for it. He didn’t deserve to live, and yet, here he was, a living, breathing freak while many others were dead and cold in the ground or trapped in limbo like Sephiroth surely was.

Sometimes Vincent wished he had told her the truth about Sephiroth, that her son had lived after childbirth. There were times when he was beyond angry and tempted to storm into that cave and tell her every little excruciating detail. But something always stopped him from going to such cruel lengths. Vincent wasn’t a cruel man, had never been. He was colder now, more jaded, but he wasn’t an asshole. At least, in his own deluded mind he wasn’t. The one thing that had never changed about him was his inability to purposely hurt the ones he cared about no matter how much they hurt him.

Looking at her now, he knew he had to do something before it was too late. He couldn’t very well walk right up to her now, not with his younger self accompanying her. Stalking away to another part of the woods, he pulled out his gun and fired a few shots in the other direction before he sprung up into a tree and moved swiftly to make it back to the woman. Hiding up in a large tree, he observed his Turk self, gun in hand, as he shushed her and motioned for her to stay put before he stealthily snuck away to investigate the disturbance. When Vincent was certain that he had gone far enough, he soundlessly leapt down from the tree and crept up behind her. Placing a hand around her mouth quickly, he clamped it tight so that she couldn’t scream. In her ear, he whispered, “Relax, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to help you, _Lucrecia_ …”

The woman turned her head as far as she could and looked at him, eyes wide with freight. When she looked up at his face, she appeared baffled by his unruly, almost demonic appearance. It wasn’t every day that a person came face to face with a vampiric looking man, after all.

“I’m going to release you now. Don’t scream, or I will kill him,” instructed Vincent. He didn’t mean it, of course, though…a part of him couldn’t help finding the idea of shooting himself strangely appealing.

When Lucrecia nodded her understanding, he slowly released her mouth and stepped back to give her some space. He watched as she slowly turned around to stare at him. It did hurt to have those beautiful eyes regarding him once again, but he wasn’t here for that. He was here for Sephiroth.

“Who…are you? What do you want?”

“I do not expect you to believe me, but I am from the future. I am here to warn you, Lucrecia. These experiments,” he started, but paused to gesture towards her midsection. “They need to stop. It is not too late. You need to stop this. Save your baby before it is too late. If you do not heed my words…then he will…die and…become a monster. You need to leave. You need to go somewhere far away from Hojo _and_ Shinra. Never let them find either of you. Nothing is more important than your baby. If you don’t do this now, you _will_ regret it in the end…”

As he fully expected, but had hoped against, Lucrecia looked at him as if he had just escaped a sanatorium. She didn’t believe him. Then again, why should she? What proof did he have, besides his own deranged sounding words?

Lucrecia shook her head slowly and began to back away as if hoping she could make a run for it without him noticing. She slowly asked, “What…what are you talking about?”

Hearing his younger self beginning to make his way back to them, Vincent growled, “Your baby is in danger. If you don’t do something now, he will die. Do you not understand that?”

As if Vincent was the true danger, the woman raised her hand to cover her stomach as if that alone would protect the precious life inside of her. It made the gunman want to bark out a humorless laugh. Not only did the woman not recognize him, (not that he could fully blame her for that), but she also believed he intended to harm her or the unborn child. The same child that she was allowing to be harmed by Hojo.

Hearing his younger self getting closer, almost within eyesight of them, Vincent began to retreat. Just before he disappeared, he looked at Lucrecia over his shoulder and said, “The last thing I want to ever do…is hurt you, or Sephiroth. All I want…is for both you and him to be safe.”

As tempting as the idea of shooting himself was, Vincent shook it off. His younger self was certainly naïve and a bit of a coward, but he didn’t deserve to die.

Not yet, anyway.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Vincent had failed to act sooner. He'd allowed his cowardice and compliance to hold himself back. It didn’t matter that most people would have done exactly as he had done. When he'd finally acted...he had been far too late. Lucrecia had been sick, and possibly the baby, too. If he had spoken up sooner, or had just dragged her away, or just simply shot Hojo dead, then maybe...

_Maybe things could have been different._

Feeling the weight of the ball in his hand, the magic thrumming within it, helped seal his conviction. Staring down at it, he felt certain that he could, no, he would change things. Even if it killed Vincent, or erased him from existence altogether, he would save Sephiroth.

Reflecting on his musings, it suddenly hit Vincent like a brick to the face: _Sephiroth_. All this time he’d been trying to convince Lucrecia, to warn her about her and her son’s fate, but to no avail. He’d even tried to forcibly abduct her and take her some place safe, but that had failed miserably, too. Vincent had even broken into Hojo’s labs to shoot him in the face in a desperate effort to save both mother and child. As satisfying as it had felt to kill the man at point blank range, it had left him cold and hollow later after realizing that he had failed once again.

Every time he’d done the wrong thing, the materia had flashed red wildly, as if angry with him, before transporting him back to his coffin. That was where he woke up every single time, a thousand times, it felt like. Just to relive _everything_ again before he could find the materia again to time travel once more. Every time he had to help Cloud hunt down and kill Sephiroth again, a little more of Vincent’s cracked heart fractured further. It was like…he was being punished for not getting it right. He didn’t know how he knew, but he strangely could _feel_ that it wanted him to do something different than what he kept doing.

Every time he had thought about changing things, it was focused on Lucrecia _and_ Sephiroth. Maybe he needed to keep his focus on the latter of the two. He wanted to save them both, but perhaps that was why he always failed. He had to accept that Lucrecia just didn’t want to be saved by anyone. As much as it killed him to admit it, he could no longer deny that her fate was the one she had handpicked for herself. Everything she had done, she’d done for herself and to herself. When his younger self had spoken to her, she hadn’t listened and when his present self had spoken to her, she still hadn’t listened. Nothing could and would get through to her…until it was too late. He was obviously wasting his time on the wrong person.

_If not her, then…_

Sephiroth was the one he needed to convince of the truth before it was too late. If he could do that, then he would save him from his dreadful fate.

~*~*~*~*~*~

The first time Vincent had approached Sephiroth, was the day he’d fallen for him.

_It had been unintentional, but…_

With his bare back facing the gunman, the younger male inquired, “Are you going to shoot me, old man?”

“Old man?” Questioned Vincent while he cocked his head slightly. He wasn’t offended in the slightest…just mystified. True, he was technically an old man, but he didn’t _look_ old. Then again, the younger man was a teenager and anything over twenty years of age was considered old to them. At least that’s how Vincent had felt when he’d been Sephiroth’s tender age of eighteen. But he wasn’t Sephiroth. What baffled him more was how he was focusing on the wrong thing when he should be wondering just how the other male had been aware of his presence. He’d been stealthy when he had approached and yet the soldier had sensed his approach and had known he was gripping a gun in his right hand. The gunman hadn’t intended to shoot him, but from his past experiences…old habits died hard. It never hurt to tread carefully, after all.

“It is what you are, is it not.” Sephiroth responded in what sounded more like a statement and less of a question. He remained with his back turned to the gunman as if he were waiting for something.

The ex-Turk found himself distracted by the long silver hair swaying in the breeze, making it lightly caress the pale skin of a strong, toned back. Years of training and battle had prepared the teenager’s fit body and no doubt his mind, for things he wasn’t quite old enough for. Sephiroth should be going to school, hanging out with his friends, then going home to his family or a nice girl. He shouldn’t be out in the wilderness with his sword in hand training himself for future battles to come. What Vincent saw before him should be a kid, but it was clear as day that he was not.

What he wanted for Sephiroth would never come to be. He would never be a child…

“You don’t talk much. I like that,” commented the younger male after a lengthy silence had passed between them.

Before he realized just what he was saying, Vincent blurted, “What I have to say, you wouldn’t believe.”

At those lowly uttered words, Sephiroth finally turned around to regard him. “Belief is best left to the fools, old man.”

Vincent slightly raised both eyebrows. “You think believing in something is pointless?”

Sephiroth scoffed. “Believing in a false god will not bring you any closer to said god, will it? If you want to believe in anything, it should be the truth.”

“But how will you know if it is the truth?” Asked the ex-Turk with a slow shake of his head.

At that, Sephiroth genuinely smiled and it was breathtakingly beautiful beyond compare. It was that very moment when the gunman felt it in his chest. It didn’t strike him like lightning like some would claim happened. No, it was slow and warm, like a chilled body being enveloped by warm water.

The soldier quietly replied, “You don’t.”

“Then why do you claim that believing in something is pointless?”

“Pursuing the truth is never pointless,” began Sephiroth as he slowly sheathed his extraordinarily long blade without lifting his intense eyes away from Vincent. His vivid gaze pinned the raven-haired man to the spot he was standing, making him feel like his muscles had lost their strength. “What is pointless is believing in something just so you don’t _have_ to think. It’s easier to fall in line, to accept everything…without ever questioning _why_.”

_That had once been him…_

Vincent had been used to hearing the irrational ramblings of a delusional man. To see the same man in the flesh, minus some of his years, and to hear him speak so rationally, was disorientating to Vincent. He hadn’t known what to expect when he’d first arrived here to face Sephiroth. All he’d known to expect was to keep one of his guns handy, just in case things got hairy.

But this…this was beyond refreshing from the gunman. Vincent rarely enjoyed speaking with people, but this young man was enjoyable to talk to even if he was a bit on the intimidating side. Something about the intelligent manner that he spoke both commanded and soothed the older man at the same time.

This young man was brimming full of intelligence and promise. It cracked Vincent’s jaded heart even more knowing that someone like this would be robbed of it all. He could be anything in life, do anything. With his looks, intellect, and physical prowess, he could help shape the world rather than destroy it like his future self had attempted to do.

“You look like you want to cry,” pointed out Sephiroth as he closely observed the older man.

Taken aback by that, the dark-haired looked away and said nothing as he blinked back unshed tears. The truth of it was that he did want to cry. He’d spent so many years bottling it all up, allowing it to eat him alive, that he’d never allowed himself to just let it out. His own broken dreams didn’t matter anymore to him. No, what did matter was changing things for the better for this beautiful man and the world around him. If tragedy could be avoided and this young man was allowed a second chance at life, then that would…

_Make Vincent’s suffering finally mean something._

When the ex-Turk felt it was safe enough to look back at the younger man, he suddenly realized that he was alone in the clearing.

Before Vincent could move to attempt finding out where the other man had ventured off to, he saw a flash of red and then suffocating darkness. When he woke up to see blue eyes, that was when he knew that he had failed again.

But unlike the other times, he didn’t feel so hopeless now.

~*~*~*~*~*~

The world that had once loved and worshipped Sephiroth, now hated him. Most of Avalanche despised him for one reason or another.

Except for Vincent. He didn't hate Sephiroth, couldn't find it in his own disillusioned self to hate him. There was no part of Vincent that could ever hate Lucrecia's fallen son. Even if he wanted to, he couldn't find a reason within his being to foster such poison. Vincent might hate what became of him, yes, but not the man personally. Unlike the others, the gunman knew that it just wasn't that simple. Beneath all that madness, there had been a troubled, caged young man shrouded in loneliness and thirsting for the truth.

Twenty some years of being experimented on and owned like property, was enough to make anyone snap. It was amazing that it hadn't happened much sooner.

The more he traveled through time, the more he became aware of just who Sephiroth had been. The more he glimpsed, the more he wanted to help. The more he saw of him, the more he… _wanted_. No matter how many times he failed, the desperation to save Sephiroth only increased. As fruitless as it seemed, he just couldn't give up on him no matter how many times he failed.

It was strange, though, that whenever Vincent found Sephiroth and attempted to tell him the truth of things, the other man dodged him. Or more like, distracted Vincent by the fluid like way that he moved and talked. Whether it was intentional or not on Sephiroth’s part, the gunman found himself baffled by his own embarrassing incompetence. It was also perplexing that every single venture back to the past, Sephiroth always referred to him as ‘old man.’ The man never seemed to remember him, but he always seemed to remember to call him by _that_ particular nickname. Despite not knowing Vincent, Sephiroth never seemed particularly alarmed or uncomfortable to be around a stranger like the gunman. Especially one as strange looking as Vincent knew he undoubtedly was. It gave him some hope that perhaps a part of the younger man did actually remember him.

“Why do you call me old man?” Inquired Vincent from the doorway of Sephiroth’s living room. He couldn’t bring himself to cross the room to the other man for fear of losing sight of his purpose. It was imperative that he didn’t stray; however, he couldn’t help wanting an answer to such a probing question.

“Why do we do any of the things that we do?” Countered the green-eyed man as he continued to stare down at the pages of an old, beaten up book. A book that had once seen better days, no doubt.

_Just like Vincent._

“Do you remember me from before?” Asked the gunman before he took one reluctant step into the modestly sized room. And then he took another and another until he was between Sephiroth and the coffee table. He couldn’t help noting the lack of a television, or anything electronic in the room. The room was decorated more like a study with a desk and several bookshelves. The only thing out of place was the black leather sofa that the younger man was currently seated on.

At those words, Sephiroth raised his eyes from his book to lock gazes with the older man. “I call you old man because of your eyes.”

“My…eyes?” Echoed the raven-haired man as he tilted his head. Feeling heat fizzle through his body at the intensity of those jade eyes boring through him, it was all he could do not to bolt out of the room like a frightened deer.

The younger man gingerly placed the book down on the table before he slowly rose from the couch to stand at his full height. A height that pleasantly matched the gunman’s own similar height. If he kissed him, he wouldn’t have to lean over or stand on his tippy toes. They could just slot their bodies together and—

**_—Shut up Shut up Shut up…_ **

“Yes, your eyes. They…are not the eyes of a young man,” explained Sephiroth as he slowly slinked around the coffee table, his eyes never leaving the ex-Turk. The way that he moved was like a wildcat hunting its prey. It was both mesmerizing and terrifying to the gunman. Mesmerizing because it made him feel human again and terrifying because it made him want something that he didn’t deserve. 

What made it even worse was the sheer proximity of the younger male to the ex-Turk. Sephiroth was so close that Vincent could feel the heat wafting off from his body and smell the sweetness of his breath. It made him want to lean closer until they touched, but he forced himself to remain firmly rooted to his spot. Teeth clenched behind tight lips, Vincent fought with every cell of his body not to do something foolish. Heart pounding in his chest so loud that he was certain the sharp soldier could hear it, he clenched his clammy hands into tight fists. It helped even less when Sephiroth lifted an arm as if to touch him…

_He should go, he should…_

“Aren’t you going to ask me why?”

Vincent blinked in surprise when he realized that the younger man had taken a step back. He didn’t know whether he should be relieved or frustrated by such a thing. Something about Sephiroth’s expression and his body language seemed to hint that he was disappointed, too. But why, Vincent didn’t know. He was probably just seeing what he wanted to see. “Why what?”

“Why I think that about your eyes.”

The gunman quietly sighed. “Tell me, then.”

“There’s a story there, in your eyes. An old one. One that I’m not ready to hear just yet.”

~*~*~*~*~*~


End file.
